Craig's Blog: Florence

It hasn't been easy getting started with a blog about our trip to Italy. I took so many pictures that it's hard to figure out what to post. These are pictures of Florence, our first stop in Italy. I think it was my favorite stop, although I liked the whole trip very much and some things turned out to be a surprise. I'm going to narrate our visit and point out some things we liked and try to give a flavor of what we saw.

Speaking of favorites, one of mine is gelato--the only frozen treat that might be better than Blue Bell ice cream. This is what it looks like first thing in the morning:

One of the first things we saw in Florence was a carousel in the Piazza della Republica. Where else but Italy would you see a merry-go-round with naked women on it?

A key thing to know about Florence is that it was ruled for centuries by one family: the Medici. You see their crest everywhere in Florence. The six balls make it instantly recognizable. Because the Medici also conquered most of the area surrounding Florence, you also see it in a lot of other cities, too.

One of the most famous sights in Florence is the Ponte Vecchio, the only bridge in Florence (through an agreement between the German defenders and the Allies) that wasn't destroyed during WWII. It started out like all the other bridges in Florence as a simple river crossing, but people expanded it by cantilevering shops out over the sides of the bridge. That's why it looks like it's enclosed. It is, in fact, enclosed but that's only part of the reason why. If you look at the top of the bridge, you can see a series of windows across its length . If you look at the bottom right of the photo, you can see what looks like a long narrow roof. Both features are part of a two kilometer long passageway created for the Medici so they could go from their palace on the south side of the river to their offices in the Uffizi on the north side without having to mix with the common folk. The passage even goes through a church, so they could attend services in the morning on their way to work. Before the passage was built, the shops on the bridge made up the town fish market. The Medicis didn't like the smell, so they moved the fish market out and the goldsmiths in. The second photo is of the goldsmiths' shops all locked down. We toured the bridge on a holiday, so they were closed.

I've got a lot of architectural shots that will come later, but this is an interesting one because it is common to all of the medieval towns of northern Italy. The truth of the matter is that the whole place is about to topple over. In a lot of the narrow alleys in Florence, Bologna and Venice, you see supports to keep the buildings from falling over on one another. There are also a lot of iron rods that go all the way through the buildings to keep the walls from falling down. The leaning Tower of Pisa is not an anomaly.

A picture of the most famous resident of Florence.

Actually this is only a copy that occupies the sculpture's original site in front of the City Hall. The original was moved to the Academia some time ago and photography is not allowed there.

The next series of pictures are of the Duomo (Florence's cathedral) and its immediate surroundings. This was the first of the big, famous churches we saw and we were really impressed. However, every town has its cathedral and each of them seems to have at least one outstanding feature.

The picture below is a detail from the bronze doors on the Baptistry, which faces the Duomo. These doors and the earlier ones on the other sides are the work of Lorenzo Ghiberti, who won the job over a much more famous artist (Fillipo Brunelleschi). The doors pictured here are from 1425 and were described by Michelangelo as worthy of being the "gates to paradise." Most people mark the beginning of the Renaissance from the date Ghiberti was given the commission to build the doors for the Baptistry.

When Brunelleschi lost the contest to build the doors for the Baptistry, he decamped for Rome to study architecture and came up with a way to finish the dome of the Duomo, a feat that would be a challenge for modern engineers.

A view of the Florence skyline from Piazza Michelangelo on the south side of the river. The Duomo dominates the city.

Here's picture of the nice lady who agreed to tour Italy with me. She was great company.

Susan thinks I'm fixated on doors. I don't understand why she says that. Here are the only two shots of doors I took during our trip. I think they are very pretty.

Everywhere you look in Florence, there's interesting architecture. Here's one of my favorite shots. It has buildings from both pre- and post-Renaissance.

In some places you get to look behind the buildings to see how they were constructed. If you look closely at this church, you can see on the right side what the building first looked like--unfinished brick. In the front you can see what it looks like after a facade was added. Some buildings never received their facade. The Duomo went for centuries without a permanent facade on the front due to lack of money and arguments over what it should look like. There are many buildings in Florence where the facade is from a completely different period from the rest of the building.